Month: February 2012

…the world is currently run by a generation whose upbringing has left them intellectually unable to be deal with modernity.

This isn’t their fault. For someone to be in charge today, they’re more than likely to be in their 50s or 60s. Which means that when the Berlin Wall fell they were most likely already steeped in an intellectual tradition that had bedded in quite far.

But what happened after 1989 was, as we all know, devastating to that tradition. The end of the bipolar world – the end of history as Fukuyama had it – and the end of the relevance of 50 years of political and military planning.

Instead, things got weird. Germany was reunited in 1990, and a few weeks later, on Christmas Day, the first web server was turned on. Nearly 21 years later, and the internet has destroyed and rebuilt everything it has touched. Hierarchies have been under attack from networks for 20 years now. History certainly didn’t end, much to everyone’s disappointment.

In my first stint at NASA, I was at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center as a mainframe systems programmer when it was still cool. That IBM 360-95 was used to solve complex computational problems for space flight. Back then, I comfortably navigated the world of IBM 360 Assembler language and still remember the much-coveted “green card” that had all the pearls of information about machine code. Back then, real systems programmers did hexadecimal arithmetic – today, “there’s an app for it!”

Home is where i want to be Pick me up and turn me round I feel numb – burn with a weak heart (so i) guess i must be having fun The less we say about it the better Make it up as we go along Feet on the ground Head in the sky It’s ok i know nothing’s wrong . . nothing

Hi yo, i got plenty of time Hi yo, you got light in your eyes And you’re standing here beside me I love the passing of time Never for money Always for love Cover up + say goodnight … say goodnight

Home – is where i want to be But i guess i’m already there I come home – -she lifted up her wings Guess that this must be the place I can’t tell one from another Did i find you, or you find me? There was a time before we were born If someone asks, this where i’ll be … where i’ll be

Hi yo we drift in and out Hi yo sing into my mouth Out of all tose kinds of people You got a face with a view I’m just an animal looking for a home Share the same space for a minute or two And you love me till my heart stops Love me till i’m dead Eyes that light up, eyes look through you Cover up the blank spots Hit me on the head ah ooh